Plaza
A Spanish surname that most often began as a place-name or topographic label for someone living by a public square.
The #5,709 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 50,822 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Spanish plaza means a town square, open public place, or market square, and it comes from Latin platea, meaning a broad street or open space. As a surname, Plaza most likely started as a locational or topographic name for someone who lived near a plaza or came from a place identified by that feature. In some cases it may also have referred more generally to a settlement square or marketplace.
History
The surname is well established in Spain and the wider Spanish-speaking world. Like many Spanish surnames, it could arise independently in different places where a family was identified by its location near the village square. It also appears in compound place-names and in historical references to streets, houses, and urban districts built around a plaza.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
In Spanish, plaza can mean both a town square and, by extension, a market or public gathering space—so the surname points to the social heart of a town.
From the historical record
“Beca. Insignia que traen los colejiales sobre el manto. La plaza o prebenda de colejial. Becerra. Especie de planta.— Becerra. Vaca de ménos de un año, Dragon, planta. Becerril. Lo que es propio del becerro.”
— Diccionario de los apellidos